Jon,
I found the written weight measurement. The trailer axle weight + tongue weight was 4226#.
The 21’s stated dry weight is 3050#. After adding Escape options, (and these are their stated weights given to me by Kim) like A/C at 140#, 12V battery at 50#, windows and insulation at 100#, oven at 58#, 2 propane tanks filled at 80#, etc., etc. I’m up to 3500-3600# from the factory. Add to this my modifications and we’re in the range of 3700-3800#.

I’m carrying another 167# of equipment (Chocks, hoses, leveling blocks, chairs, stoves, etc) + our personal items, food, water, kitchen equipment, toys and games etc. and it all adds up to the 4226#. I believe that’s without a full load of water.

Maybe I need to learn how to pack, but if you take 1000# off that you’re very near the dry weight of the 21.
Tom

This is the WDH bar from mine. Don't know if anything changed since 2008.

That's the same one I got with my 2014 17B. Also, thanks again to everyone for posting the tips and related info- much appreciated. I did some research today and I'm going to give it a whirl in the next week or so trying to get the weights sorted out.

OK, the spreadsheet has been updated. Again, if you weight your trailers (any brand) please let me know so I can add it to the spreadsheet. It is useful to give those shopping for tow vehicles an idea of the actual weights of both loaded trailers & what they can expect for tongue weight.

Combining four values each of which have +/-10 lbs precision and potentially greater inaccuracy results in only an approximate tongue weight, but the method is sound, so we can work with the 350 lb value.

Adding 350 lb to the hitch lifted 200 lb off the front axle - seems about right for the proportions of the Xterra (rear axle to hitch ball almost half of the wheelbase, so load shift is almost half of the hitch load; these numbers suggest about 4/7 or 57% of the 110 inch wheelbase, which would be 63").

The result is substantially rear-heavy, so I can understand wanting a WD hitch. The rear axle load increase (including load transfer from the front) is 550 pounds. Hugh, how close is 3000 lb to the rear GAWR (which is not given in the owner's manual)? Reaching or exceeding GAWR would be another reason for wanting WD. I suspect from a post in RV.Net that GAWR-rear may be only 2850 lb so WD would be required.

The Gross Vehicle Weight (GVW) of 5350 is very close to what I think from the manual is the Gross Vehicle Weight Rating (GVWR): 5400 lb.

It doesn't have anything to do with the use of WD, but these numbers provide a Gross Combined Weight (GCW) of 8600 lb, which is well within the Xterra's Gross Combined Weight Rating (GCWR) of 9658 lb.

This says that the WD is forcing 250 lb back onto the front axle, and only 50 lb onto the trailer's axles, for a total of 300 lb off of the rear axle. The total is fine, but the proportion is impossible, since the distance from rear axle to trailer axles is nowhere near five times the wheelbase. This is where the accumulation of scale reading errors can be a problem, or perhaps the scale is slightly sloped up compared to surrounding areas so the WD action is too high when the front axle is on the scale and too low when the trailer is on it, or perhaps slight unlevel conditions around the scale are messing with the ball height and thus the tongue weight.

A reasonable guess might be that the front axle reading should have been 2550 lb and the trailer axle should have been 3350 lb, for the same total load transfer distributed 200 lb to the front axle and 100 lb to the trailer axle... that would be in about the right proportions for the dimensions of the Xterra and Escape 19'.

The WD system only takes about 100 pounds off of the Xterra, so the tug appears to be still very close to its Gross Vehicle Weight Rating (GVWR); WD is not a good fix for GVW problems. On the other hand, taking 300 lb off the rear axle is good for staying within GAWR (that is fundamentally what WD is for).

All of this is about Hugh's Xterra plus Escape 19', not Al's Tacoma plus Escape 17B. The point is that with these scale readings, one can see what the WD is doing, whether is it needed, and if it is doing what you want. The 17B is lighter than a 19', the Tacoma has longer wheelbase than an Xterra (so it will experience less load transfer off the front axle for a given hitch weight), and the Tacoma probably has less load on the rear axle to start with and higher rear axle capacity; for all of these reasons, Al should need WD much less than Hugh; I doubt he needs it at all.

So our loaded 19' is about 3600 lb. I'm sure it'll increase some as we gather more "stuff" but currently that's it. The combination works very well and we couldn't be happier with the way it pulls.

Thanks.

Just an observation after further review.
If I was using the weights taken to determine tongue weights with and without the WDH, my results would be different. My understanding of how to use the 3 sets of weights taken is:

1 - Calculate the difference from the unhitched rear axle weight and the hitched rear axle weight without the WDH engaged.
In this case, subtracting the unhitched rear axle weight of 2,450 pounds from the hitched rear axle weight (no WDH) of 3,000 pounds yields a tongue weight of 550 pounds, not 350 pounds.

2 - Calculate the difference from the unhitched rear axle weight and the hitched rear axle weight with the WDH engaged.
With the WDH engaged, calculations show 250 pounds was transferred from the tongue to the front axle and 50 pounds was transferred back to the trailer axle for an effective tongue weight of 250 pounds.

Combining the tongue weight of 550 pounds and 3,250 pounds on the trailer axles in the 1st set of weights yields a trailer weight of 3,800 pounds.

Which ever set of numbers is correct, the setup you have works well for you and that's what is important.